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by Frumpologist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Infertility
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-19
Updated: 2019-04-19
Packaged: 2020-01-16 17:14:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18525994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frumpologist/pseuds/Frumpologist
Summary: Hermione is avoiding Harry after having their marriage dissolved. Harry won’t be avoided that easily.





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**Author's Note:**

> Written for Harmony & Co.’s Lyric Llama challenge. I was provided with a random lyric as inspiration. My lyric was: “I told myself I won’t miss you, but I remembered what it feels like beside you.” from the song Better Than Me by Hinder.

She is a mess of nervous energy. Her hands fidget with the ringlets of hair that falls over her shoulder. Her eyes dart around the room, searching — always searching for him. The corner of her bottom lip is crushed between her teeth. Someone is talking at her, a tall bloke with nice hair and a charming smile, but she doesn’t see him and she doesn’t hear him. 

Instead, the thudding of her heart overpowers the rhythm of the music. Her frantic search drowns out the bluebell flames that light the room. 

Something blue, she almost laughs. They hadn’t worried about the old myth on their wedding day, but Ron’s wife sure does today. The bridesmaids are covered in navy robes and the groomsmen all sport the same powder blue ties. 

Blue is everywhere. 

Perhaps that’s where they’d gone wrong. 

_ It’ll be fine,  _ Harry had said.  _ Loads of happy marriages don’t have something blue at the ceremony.  _

But here she is, both aggressively avoiding him and nervously seeking him out. She loves him still, loved him even as she signed her name —  _ Hermione Jean Potter — _ on the divorce decree. Hermione didn’t cry that day, wouldn’t allow herself to wallow in the end of her marriage. But she cries now, alone in a bed that’s too big, in a house that’s too quiet, with a life that’s too — Harry Potter-less.

Out of the corner of her eye she catches a flash of his untidy hair. Her heart stops. It skips several beats. She forgets to breathe. 

“Hermione?” 

It’s like someone has shoved cotton into her ears. She can’t focus on the voice, can’t force herself to turn to its owner and acknowledge him. 

“Hermione?” 

Fingers squeeze her shoulder. Hermione’s eyes finally draw away from the spot where she’d caught sight of Harry. He’s long gone and lost to the crowd and her breath returns to her in a heavy gasp. Her eyes, unfocused and fuzzy, finally sharpen and stare at the man next to her. 

“Ron,” she breathes, the beginning of a sob threatening to fly from her lips. 

“There you are.” He runs a hand through his ginger mop and grins that Ron smile that used to coax one from her so easily. It doesn’t now. “Merlin, I thought you were having some sort of fit.”

“I have to go.” 

Even as she says the words, her feet begin to carry her away. She can’t do this, can’t be in the same room as him. She’s so close to crumbling and she can’t let him see.

“Go?” Ron catches her elbow. “You can’t leave yet. We haven’t even done the dance. Lavender's excited for that bit.”

Hermione yanks her arm away and nearly tumbles straight into another body. She doesn’t even need to look up. She’d know that scent anywhere. It’s  _ him  _ and he smells like home. 

Her heart clenches. 

“Give—” She swallows around a lump in her throat and straightens her shoulders, trying to be strong. “Give Lavender my love.”

“Hermione!” Ron steps forward, calls after her, but she doesn’t stop and she doesn’t look back. 

It’s raining outside. Cold drizzle typical of London, the type that changes her curly hair into a disaster of frizz atop her head. But, she doesn’t care. She needs to get as far away from the wedding as possible. She needs to run away and never look back – never look into those earnest green eyes again. 

It hurts too much. 

The way he loves her, the way he gives up everything for her – it’s too much. He’s already lost so much, already has sacrificed everything. She refuses to ask for more of him. She refuses to let him see what their divorce has done to her. He doesn’t deserve it— she doesn’t deserve him. 

“Hermione.” 

His familiar tone rips at her heart and chokes her throat. She ignores the way the puddles of rain slosh against her high heeled foot. She needs to find the apparition point so that she can go somewhere—anywhere—that’s not here. 

He chases after her, a puff in his voice as he calls out for her again and again. She doesn’t stop and rounds a corner and another and hopes that it’s enough to hide from him. Her back rests against the brick of an old building. Her dress is practically see-through from the onslaught of the rain. Her breath fogs in front of her face as she hisses out sharp and shallow breaths.

She’s only a block away from the nearest place she can apparate from. She swallows down her nerves and presses a palm to the middle of her chest. There’s no sound chasing her anymore, no call of her name from his lips. So, she pushes off the brick wall and launches herself down the block. 

Her open toe heel is a hair’s breadth away from the apparition barrier and she feels his hand encircle her elbow. He pulls her back gently and turns her around. His shadowed chin meets her gaze and she’s afraid to look higher, afraid to see those haunting eyes staring back at her. Hermione licks her lips and closes her eyes trying to will herself away. 

“Hermione.” It’s like a prayer leaving his lips, a plea that leaves him so softly she almost gives in. “Look at me, Hermione.” 

She shakes her head and squeezes her eyes tighter. No. Getting lost in his eyes won’t take away the pain she’s been in, nor will it make their divorce any less necessary. His hand is on her chin, thumb and forefinger applying the faintest bit of pressure and tilting her face up and up. 

“Harry, I can’t—”

“You can,” he says, fingers trailing the line of her jaw. “You should. I’m not going anywhere this time. I’m not running away from this again.” 

“You need to let me go.” Her molars grind together and it’s taking everything in her power not to open her eyes and allow herself to give in. “Harry, this can’t work. We tried and it just… it can’t work.” 

“It can.” His fingers are tangling in her matted, wet curls at the base of her neck. She feels him step closer, the warmth of his body radiating from him like growing flames. His free hand skirts along her spine and encourages her to bend toward him. “We can do this. I want to do this.”

“We agreed.” She shivers as his fingers dance along her exposed skin. “You want children and I can’t—I can’t give that to you.” 

“No.” The hand twisted in her hair tightens at her scalp, the hand on her back brings her as close as she can get without being flush against him. “ _ You _ decided that I want children and  _ you _ decided that the only solution was to dissolve our marriage.”

“You’ll resent me one day.” Finally, she opens her eyes. She has to make him see, force Harry to understand why. 

The weight of his sadness hits her like a wrecking ball right in the gut. She no longer feels the rain or hears it pinging off various gutters and windows. Instead all she can feel is his body so close and all she can hear are the desperate shallow breaths as he tries to understand. 

“I can’t give you what you need,” she whispers faintly, hands balling into fists at her sides because Merlin if she touches him it’s all over. “You shouldn’t have to sacrifice anymore. It’s not fair.”

His fingers dance across her cheekbone and push a sodden curl from her face. His eyes close, lips open to release a sad, short breath. When he opens his eyes the sincerity in them knocks her breath away. She wants to cry. 

“I won’t sacrifice  _ you _ ,” he says quietly. “I tried to be okay with your decision. I thought I’d stop missing you. But then I lay in bed and it’s so cold now.”

“Harry—” his name catches on the beginning of a sob. “It’s too much, to think that one day— you’ll hate me, Harry.”

“I could never.” It chases from his lips faster than she can say his name. 

The pads of his fingers run the length of her arm and then he twines their hands together. She can’t break free— he won’t allow it. He twists their hands and places them together over his heart. 

“I don’t function right without you.” 

Her heart hammers In her chest. His face is so close, lips nearly on hers and drawing her in. She’s breaking in half and filling with hope all at the same time and it’s going to kill her. 

“I burn all the food.” He smiles. She almost joins him; he’s always burned all the food. “I can’t sleep.”

Neither can she. The only reason she doesn’t have black bags under her eyes tonight is because Lavender is the queen of glamour charms. Her resolve cracks a little; she’d give anything to sleep the way she sleep with Harry next to her. 

Safe. Warm.

“I can’t do this without you.” His hand squeezes hers and she feels his heartbeat, slow and sure, on the back of her hand. “I don’t  _ want _ to do this without you.”

“Harry, please—” 

But his lips are so soft, so full, and so sure against hers. The desperate noise in the back of her throat echoes Harry’s as he coaxes her lips apart and deepens their kiss. She should push away, should leave him before it’s too hard to turn away. But, it’s perfect and it’s Harry and she’s missed him so much.

He doesn’t push her. Harry’s lips move against hers for only a moment. But, it’s enough. Merlin, is it enough. She nearly launches herself at him just to keep the simmering need stirring in her belly. She’s warm for the first time in months. 

His forehead rests against hers and she knows she’s crying but can’t feel the tears as the rain continues to whip down around them. 

“Come home, Hermione,” he begs her on a whisper. “Please come home to me.”

“Harry, it doesn’t change anything.” She pulls away and untangles her hand from his and tries—through tears and a raw throat— to make him understand. “I can’t give you kids. Dolohov’s curse—”

“So, we’ll get a dog.” He’s smiling that Harry smile that dimples his cheeks and lights his eyes. “Two dogs. James and Sirius.”

She can’t stop the thick, wet laugh that leaves her. It takes all of her willpower to force her face into a serious expression. 

“That’s not what you want.”

“You.” Harry takes her face in his hands and he’s so earnest it nearly burns her up. “You’re what I want.”

“But—”

“You’re  _ enough _ .” He kisses her again. “You’re everything and you’re enough.” And again. And again. And again. “Come home with me.”

Her defenses slip. Hermione sighs against his lips. He’s relentless and he’s always been and it’s one of the things she loves the most about him and she can’t tell him no. 

“Take me home, Harry,” she agrees finally, quietly. 

They’re gone from the street with a furious crack.  
  



End file.
